I've only started hearing about this in full over the last week or so, but some of the details sound absolutely horrifying. At the very least, it sounds like confirmation that Murdoch was happy running a reckless culture that allowed this. Whatever I think of their journalism at times, I doubt a Guardian or NYT reporter would employ someone to breach voicemail.

/still thinks of the Last Night on Earth lyric every time News of the World is mentioned

I've only started hearing about this in full over the last week or so, but some of the details sound absolutely horrifying. At the very least, it sounds like confirmation that Murdoch was happy running a reckless culture that allowed this.

Not reckless. Standard.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mobvok

Whatever I think of their journalism at times, I doubt a Guardian or NYT reporter would employ someone to breach voicemail.

They probably have, but certainly not in cases like these. Not frivolous celebrity bullshit, and certainly not the low, disgusting, hacking of families of dead soldiers, terrorism victims etc for pure profit. And it's the stellar real journalism at the Guardian that has blown all of this into the open. There's really no comparison between what outlets like the Guardian and NYT do and what News Ltd newspapers do - save for maybe three of their titles worldwide (and even those don't do this kind of work.)

The actual hacking component of the story will be something that will likely blow up and die down. The News of the World title might never fully recover from it (mind you, it's readers are probably paying little attention anyway), but the real story is the wider News Ltd reach and influence. It's not just a dirty investigator hacking some murdered kids phone, it's police corruption and Brooks and Coulson and Cameron and Blair and BSkyB and political influence and lying and leaning and all for profit only - all of that shit.

It's fair to say that generally, the public here hates Murdoch/News Ltd and detests their influence over politics. Fair to say that a lot of politicians feel the same way, but have been too shit-scared to say anything about it. Watching them stand up one after the other in parliament yesterday to stick the knife into Murdoch/News Ltd was a seismic thing, and great to watch.

It's daft the guardian has been going on and on about the phone hacking for something like 5 years now, during which time Andy Coulson the former editor of NOW had been lurking around as Cameron's communications director, who is now to be arrested. None of the other papers or media outlets such as the BBC bothered with this story until very recently when it became impossible to turn a blind eye, but I still do wonder in general about their silence in years gone by on this front.

The Guardian is also reporting another senior figure is to be arrested but are not releasing the name in order not to prejudice the investigation.

And just on Murdoch, is it ethical that one man should own so much of the media in one country? I still think the BSkyB deal will get approved but at the earliest it will be in September now due to the number of submissions by the public to Hunt the culture secretary to reconsider.

Shell game? Yes. But it's being reported that way - everyone can see through it. They've been quietly shuffling the decks between The Sun and News of the World for a while so that they're effectively a singular seven day operation anyway, so this is just really drastic/forced re-branding of the Sunday paper. But if it's in the hope of stifling the story, not a chance, it's got a few notches to go up yet. And it sounds like staff at News Intl. are at borderline mutiny too. All this and the one executive everyone wants to see walk the plank is being protected - over the jobs of 200+ others now too - by Murdoch, so why? Big story that will get bigger.

I am sorry people are going to lose their jobs, but this is a great day for real journalism, a victory for the forces of civil discourse and, dare I say it, intellectualism against dumbing down.

Unfortunately, however, a sizeable proportion of the population is bovine, crass, unteachable and vulgar (as witnessed by the enormous circulation figures enjoyed by the NOTW throughout the course of its long life - and the paper followed a template of sensationalism long before the years of Rupert Murdoch's proprietorship) - so it's logical to expect the market for this kind of stuff has not disappeared and a successor will emerge to fill the gap.

^ Though that's decidely weighed towards scandals this side of the pond.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LJT

None of the other papers or media outlets such as the BBC bothered with this story until very recently when it became impossible to turn a blind eye, but I still do wonder in general about their silence in years gone by on this front.

Wasn't it also widely known or assumed that they'd hacked into the phones of various celebrities over the years? Once you've done that and seen it profit handsomely (or at least enough to justify any settlement payments), then it's surely only a question of time before you'll be willing to do it to private individuals.

In 2008, Formula One racing president Max Mosely successfully sued News Corp.'s British tabloid, the News of the World, for secretly recording him performing sadomasochistic sex acts with five prostitutes. The News of the World made a great show of its outrage over its reporter's ethical breach, insisting the spying was a one-off situation

The Daily Beast is all over the place here.

Max Mosley didn't sue the NOTW for recording him, he sued the NOTW for libel for claiming it was a Nazi-themed BDSM session.

Secondly, in this instance, the NOTW backed its reporters after the verdict, insisting that Mosley was involved in DEPRAVED AND DISGUSTING PERVERTED PRACTICES (blah blah blah).

Thirdly (and in fairness, most reporting of this episode gets this bit wrong) the women were not prostitutes, in the ordinary sense of that term. They were fetish models who were active in that scene. (Prostitution implies you just do it for money, these were into the scene.) The fully story is told accurately on various blogs. (*)

Before the Mosley case, there was another episode where a senior reporter was jailed for four months for illegally hacking into mobile phones belonging to senior royal aides. In this case, the NOTW circled the wagons, condemning the editor's actions and claiming the incident was an aberration.

Ah, well sounds like maybe they should've stuck with covering News Corp.'s misdeeds closer to home then. Thanks for the clarification, I'd never even heard of Max Mosley (or Nazi-themed fetish models for that matter, though I'm not surprised they exist...).

Ah, well sounds like maybe they should've stuck with covering News Corp.'s misdeeds closer to home then. Thanks for the clarification, I'd never even heard of Max Mosley (or Nazi-themed fetish models for that matter, though I'm not surprised they exist...).

Max Mosley is the former president of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (Formula One governing body) and son of Oswald Mosley, the founder of the British Union of Fascists and Hitler's biggest fan in Britain during the 1930s. Part of what made the story so juicy was this family connection. The NOTW seem to have put 2 and 2 together and made 5.

In fact, the court fully accepted Mosley's argument that the party, or sex session, or whatever we are going to call it, was not Nazi-themed (though even if it was, personally, I'd argue that if they're consenting adults, which they clearly were, what they got up to was no business of the general public.) Also, they weren't Nazi-themed fetish models as such, they were spanking afficionados that did some modelling work or private sessions for payment on the side, as I understand it. One was apparently a highly qualified research scientist, for example. Another was seemingly the wife of an M15 spy.

A number of ordinary law-abiding middle class people had their reputations over nothing, and had to appear in court when I'm sure they would rather have stayed well out of the public eye. However the fetish community is protective of its own, so they agreed to Max Mosley's request to testify, but I'm sure the whole episode was extremely embarassing for them and for Mosley even though he won the case.

By the way, Max Mosley's gifted son committed suicide about a year after his father's contretemps with the NOTW. I'm not suggesting this tragedy was anything to do with his father's travails, as he apparently had issues with drugs, but you never know.

Now the tables are truly turned. This is what I meant when I said earlier that revenge is a dish best served cold.